That stack of doom ...

[Hermann the Lombard]

Originally posted by Shaka II
So it takes three cats to do the job that two trebuchets might do, if the cost is the same, it's a wash.

Hmm...in terms of risk/reward I'd rather take 3 shots at collateral damage and have one cat survive rather than 2 shots with maybe one surviving.

When it comes down to it, siege engines powered by sinew or counterweights lasted as long in the real world as they did in the game...but there was a great variety of them, from anti-personnel weapons like scorpions and ballistae through wall-busters like trebuchets, but since some catapults could hurl incendiary missiles (or bio-war missiles like dead cows) or psi-war missiles (like the heads of captives), it seems like there should be some chance to damage units or population.

Granted it was a bit too easy in Civ2 and Civ3 to use the missile units to soften up the defenders enough that you could cherry pick while killing off the cripples. I did like that you could occasionally break something that you wanted to capture. Likewise an assault should occasionally get out of hand and the victorious troops should run amok as at Badajoz or a thousand other sieges.

[Ellestar]

There are no stacks of doom. There only may be not enough catapults to kill these stacks

[couerdelion]

No stacks of doom!!

I wonder if Peter was watching my small stack of 9 Cats, 5 Gren, 3 Musketeers, WE and Pike approaching St Petersburg thinking to himself that he “didn’t have enough Cats”. It didn’t stop him sending one out just before I launched my attack and leaving one of my units to need an extra turn to heal.

[mutax2003]

Maybe trebuchet can be a UU for the Byzantium empire, who was renowned for great engineering achievements. It replaces catapult, with strength of 7, and starts off with collateral damage.

[Shaka II]

Originally posted by Hermann the Lombard

Hmm...in terms of risk/reward I'd rather take 3 shots at collateral damage and have one cat survive rather than 2 shots with maybe one surviving.

I was just giving an example. If there was a new intermediate unit like a trebuchet, the strengths, collateral damage, and withdraw characteristics would have to be adjusted to the cost, to provide a benefit due to the increase in technology (engineering), but not to be overpowering. With the same 25% withdraw probability, an attack strength of 8 might mean more survive, like cannons do.

Originally posted by Hermann the Lombard

When it comes down to it, siege engines powered by sinew or counterweights lasted as long in the real world as they did in the game...but there was a great variety of them, from anti-personnel weapons like scorpions and ballistae through wall-busters like trebuchets, but since some catapults could hurl incendiary missiles (or bio-war missiles like dead cows) or psi-war missiles (like the heads of captives), it seems like there should be some chance to damage units or population.

There already is damage caused by capturing a city. Usually, I only take a city if I can defend it. I'll wait an extra turn to make sure I can to avoid having to recapture it, resulting in even more damage. I like to preserve as much infrastructure as I can in my captured cities, including courthouses and gold towns.

Originally posted by Hermann the Lombard

Granted it was a bit too easy in Civ2 and Civ3 to use the missile units to soften up the defenders enough that you could cherry pick while killing off the cripples. I did like that you could occasionally break something that you wanted to capture. Likewise an assault should occasionally get out of hand and the victorious troops should run amok as at Badajoz or a thousand other sieges.

One of the best improvements from CivIII to CivIV was the change in siege or artillery use. Remember having to bombard a city of size 20 down to size less than 6 to take it, using about 20 artillery? It's perfect now, and the artillery get to be used in attack. Fewer units is more fun. And in CivIII, the catapult was not a very useful unit. Now it's essential.

[padillah]

It looks to me like the problem comes, not from the usefullness of catapults, but from the inability to choose the defender. You have to "work your way down" to the ones you can beat. This causes an imbalance in your defense rather than an imbalance in the attack - you have to stack up 12 knights just to get through the 10 Spear/Pike and down to the 2 Crossbows.

The ability, or maybe just the chance, to hit a non-counter unit should have been intoduced. This wouldn't have to be a BIG chance, say 5%, just enough of a chance that should you have to attack a SoD you may have a fighting chance. Just enough to make the attacker think - "Maybe I should not rely on this one stack to do everything."

Tom P.

[marvinkosh]

I agree that it would be nice to be able to interrogate a square containing a large stack of units and get a clearer picture of what you're up against.

Of course ideally you never want to get into the situation where these stacks exist. If you're going to war, then be the aggressor not the victim. You won't get an enemy to sue for peace until you have done them considerable damage.

Remember that when you have to actually start paying money for units, you have an army that may be large and versatile enough to handle whatever is thrown at you.

I don't just build a barracks in big-hammer cities, I build them in smaller cities that might take twice as long to finish training a unit. This lets me continue to modernise and improve my army as time goes by, while allowing powerhouse cities to be tied up for some time on important projects and wonders.

Also, it never hurts to get some intel on your future opponents so you can plan which types of units to build in sufficient quantity. Take advantage of any open-borders treaties to really spy on those big stacks - because when you move a unit into the same square you can scroll sideways through all the units present.

[PaganPaulwhisky]

The ability, or maybe just the chance, to hit a non-counter unit should have been intoduced. This wouldn't have to be a BIG chance, say 5%, just enough of a chance that should you have to attack a SoD you may have a fighting chance. Just enough to make the attacker think - "Maybe I should not rely on this one stack to do everything."

That's a really good idea. I like this option much better than enforcing a stack limit. Some units (particularly mobile ones like cavalry could have higher chances). It is rather frustrating having to waste a large portion of your best troops to take down nuisance stack defenders.

[Generaldoktor]

Can't we all just get along?

I read the whole thread and I think it's great that nobody got ignored or moderator-warned about flaming. Impassioned discussion!

That being said, here's my two cents.

Trebuchet: I buy the argument it upsets game balance. Catapaults stand in for all the types of sinew-powered siege engines mentioned. It's a generic term.

Bombards: Maybe, with Gunpowder. Just the other day I mentioned on another thread that the Turks had great "cannon" (essentially bombards) at Constantinople in 1453. Gunpowder siege weapons should be available with hand weapons as they really did appear at about the same time and actually evolved in effectiveness a little faster.

Stack Limits: Not unless you do it exactly like CTP's system with the "flankers" and missle troops in the back row, which might change the now-favored usage of catapaults (and archers.)

Saurus' Dilemma: No disrespect intended, you've been flamed enough. But the gang is right. This stack should be able to be chipped away. Pop slave-rush or buy what you need. It is indeed your fault if your military was too tiny. Reload to where Catherine invades and practice till you get it. Or reload to before and get yourself an army. Or start playing on lower difficulty levels. I almost never play above Noble because I don't like AI "cheats."

Rule Changes: By corollary with my comment above about "The Dilemma." You don't modify the car because the driver drove it into a tree. The system works, trust me, I'm an impartial observer.

[Shaka II]

Originally posted by Generaldoktor

Trebuchet: I buy the argument it upsets game balance. Catapaults stand in for all the types of sinew-powered siege engines mentioned. It's a generic term.

How does it upset the game balance? If the average unit strength when cataputs (strength 5) first come out is 6, why shouldn't the siege unit strength move to 8 when the average unit strength is 8? Likewise, when cannons (strength 12) come out, the average unit strength is 12. It's just a ratiometric system, a game play issue really. But there really were trebuchets and the expansion pack appears to have them.

Preview (concept art) of unit for the expansion pack. Looks dangerous, maybe even requiring the engineering advance.



Edited to correct cat strength (5 not 6).

[Generaldoktor]

Okay, Blake posited the argument against trebuchet in post #65 above in this thread. I buy the argument. If trebuchets are already in the expansion pack and I do marvel at how you guys get all this inside information about what Firaxis/2K are doing, I will use them. And I will use them well.

[Generaldoktor]

Originally posted by Generaldoktor
Okay, Blake posited the argument against trebuchet in post #65 above in this thread. I buy the argument. If trebuchets are already in the expansion pack and I do marvel at how you guys get all this inside information about what Firaxis/2K are doing, I will use them. And I will use them well.

I hate quoting myself, I really do. But I wanted to add Coeurdelion has a further argument against trebs in post #64 and I agree with that too.

[Blake]

Another possible solution to the SoD "problem" could be giving all units collatoral, this is how it was in SMAC, and the collatoral was more severe than in Civ4. However units in cities and bunkers were immune to collatoral.
Anyway, there were no SoD's in the open in SMAC, all fighting was pretty much based on air power, and rovers with their retreat (on defense) chance, along with using roads and magtubes to shuttle up 1-move defenders in a single turn.
The AI was outragouesly easy to fight off though, especially when forced to attack through chokepoints.

In the context of Civ4, normal unit collatoral could be like 1-2 extra targets hit in larger stacks, say 15-25% (randomly) of the stack size, rounded down, never higher than 2.

I don't think anything like this could or should be in an expansion, but it's probably a concept modders will experiment with

[Shaka II]

I mistakenly used a strength of 6 for the cat in my last post, when really it's a strength of 5. So, the geometric mean of the catapult strength and the cannon strength is (5*12)^1/2=7.75, which we could round up to 8. The geometric mean of the cost is (40*100)^1/2 = 63 hammers. I think the geometric mean is more appropriate than the arithmetic mean, since growth in civ is more or less parabolic with time (moves).

Probably a strength of 8 with a cost of 65 hammers, or a strength of 7 with a cost of 55 hammers is about right.

We might also consider giving knights a bonus against trebuchets in the same way that horse archers (6+50% = 9 vs. cats) have a bonus against cats (5), and cavalry (15+50%=22.5 vs. cannon) have a bonus against cannons. It seems logical then to give knight (10) a 50% bonus against trebuchets if they are strength 8, or perhaps a bonus of 25% if they are strength 7.

I really doesn't matter to me. I can still get the job done with cats. It just takes a few more to build. But since they're cheaper than trebuchets, I think it's a wash.

But you should look at the expessions on the faces of my grenadiers when they see these shabby old catapults marching along side them. I have to explain that while some may be 500 years old, they probably have city raider III or barrage II promotions and that they're really better than they look. Still, I think they would be suitably impressed by seeing a trebuchet or two.

[Generaldoktor]

Originally posted by Shaka II
But you should look at the expessions on the faces of my grenadiers when they see these shabby old catapults marching along side them. I have to explain that while some may be 500 years old, they probably have city raider III or barrage II promotions and that they're really better than they look. Still, I think they would be suitably impressed by seeing a trebuchet or two.

I think you are anthropomorphizing a bit much. Perhaps you should take a little time away from the game.